INDIVIDUAL CONCEPT BOARD

JIL SANDER AW 16 MENSWEAR ANDROGYNY CONCEPT BOARD - BEAU SCARLETT-PITT - 04/11/2014

From the group brainstorming session, we all had the task of creating individual moodboards in order to piece together the group concept board. For me, this was a very important part of the design process as it helped me discover the mood of what I want to produce as an end result. I kept all the images in black and white as I wanted to concentrate on on the gender-less features as oppose to associating colour with sex.

I also wanted to establish the aesthetic of the Jil Sander design house early throughout my book so that I could channel the minimalistic edge that they have to their brand. I feel that this particular layout will help me throughout the design process and also to adapt my style.

It was initially a challenge to source images that weren’t directly fashion related as androgyny can be interpreted as a subculture of fashion. I went back to our group discussion board to find key words to search. This was when I started to looking into gender conventions such as "Boys don't cry.", "Hit like a girl" and "Men aren't capable of housework.". I found that these images much more interesting and they gave me more context as to what a gender-less being would be rather than scrolling through countless identical fashion images. 

As I was to be dealing with two different body structures, I wanted to gather some images of the male and female form. I came across Eadweard Muybridge's works on the male and female form in motion. These pictures offered me a different perspective on the structures of both bodies which I rate as a very important part of research for this project. This has lead me to delve further into Wuybridge's works for my next piece of research and extract ideas for designing.

Next, I wanted to look for a muse in order to always have an ideal in my head as to who I am designing for. I looked at the likes of David Bowie and Gary Newman, but I didn’t feel the connection to design for them because they are already somewhat established in the world of androgyny. After a few hours of trolling agency websites, I found my muse. German Zhuravsky. He portrays femininity and masculinity simultaneously which is what drew me to him.

Reflecting back on this process, I am really happy with my concept board as it has made me want to immediately start exploring androgyny artistically and start designing. Without doing something like this, I would have been stuck for ideas on how to start this project. It has really got the design ball rolling in my head and I am excited to present it to the rest of my group.